1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a technique for generating a work instruction document required for computer system installation work or the like. More particularly, the present invention relates to a work instruction document generating apparatus, a work instruction document generating method and a work instruction document generating program for automatically generating a work instruction document for helping with computer system construction and field work, by using CAD (Computer Aided Design) data.
2. Description of the Related Art
If a computer system is designed in order to meet demands of a user who are to install the computer system, it is carried out to change an information processing device with a standard configuration, which is an aggregation of multiple parts such as a CPU and a memory (hereinafter referred to as “standard configuration article” or “product”), by adding/exchanging (also referred to as “replacing”) or removing an article, which is not an standard configuration ones, namely, an external storage device, a network device, a device adapter or other parts, so as to change components of the computer system. Generally, in this way, a system configuration is designed in accordance with the user's demands.
If the computer system designed in this way is installed at the user's installation location, a system provider arranges the standard configuration article of the system or other parts to constitute the computer system, checks delivery thereof and assembles them at the installation site. The check of the delivery and the assembly at the installation location are performed by an installation operator called a CE (Customer Engineer) at the site. At this time, the installation operator works by referring to a system design drawing or a list of configuration articles, and in some instances, a note of work procedures written by a system designer or the like.
Among information for supporting this operation, the most useful information particularly for the installation operator is information about difference between the components of the standard configuration article shipped from a factory and the components actually used in the system described on the system design drawing. If the designed system is composed only of a combination of standard configuration article, the system installation is completed only by simply connecting those shipped standard configuration article.
Generally, in the system design, a system configuration is often changed by addition, replacement, removal of various components; for example, adding an input/output device which is not included in a list of the standard configuration article, replacing a low-speed CPU by a high-speed CPU, or removing an unnecessary memory. In this case, the installation operator needs to confirm a components to be added to, replaced/removed from the standard configuration article, one by one, and work for adding, replacing or removing them. Therefore, it is conceivable that when a difference of the components between the system design drawing and the standard configuration article is clearly known there, the installation operator can easily work without errors. In other words, it is conceivable that if there is something recorded in which information indicating the difference between the components set in the system design drawing and the parts configuration of the standard configuration article is described, the installation operator will be able to use it as a work instruction document effectively.
As one example of conventional techniques for comparing configurations before and after change of design of the configuration and outputting instruction information for change operation, there is a technique described in the following Patent Document 1. In this Patent Document 1 describes a technique in which, if a drawing of a control board housing various instruments is revised, that is, the design has been changed, some information on instrument, arrangement, cable assembly or wire connections and the like before changing a design of configuration are compared with those after changing the design, and a work instruction drawings indicating to change wire connections is generated in order to save a designer's task load and generate work instruction drawing that an operator can easily understand the change shown therein.
(Patent Document 1: Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2003-284212)
For example, if concepts of the technique shown in the above described Patent Document 1 are used in order to compare the configuration of the system before the design change with the one after the design change as a whole, extract a difference thereof and generate the work instruction document, there may be a problem as follows. Generally, the computer system is often composed of a combination of multiple partially-changed configurations of the standard configuration article such as a server device. However, according to the technique of the above described Patent Document 1, it is not possible to clip a portion of the system design, compare the configuration before the design change with the configuration after the design change for each clipped portion, extract the difference thereof, and thereby automatically generate the work instruction document for each clipped portion. In other words, according to the concepts of the technique described in Patent Document 1, even if the difference between the entire combination of the standard configuration article and the entire components described in the system design drawing can be extracted, information on what kind of change has been applied to which part cannot be extracted for each standard configuration article.
FIGS. 46 and 47 are diagrams illustrating examples of the computer system design. FIG. 46 illustrates an example of a system composed of standard products before the design change and FIG. 47 illustrates an example of the system shown in FIG. 46 of which the design has been changed.
The computer system is generally constructed with multiple information devices. Respective different design changes are also often applied to the respective information devices. Also in the examples of FIGS. 46 and 47, the different design changes are applied to the respective information devices.
In this example, if the concepts of the technique shown in the above described Patent Document 1 are used, it is possible to extract a difference between the entire system configurations shown in FIGS. 46 and 47 to generate the work instruction document. In other words, it is conceivable that the difference between the configurations as the entire drawings can be extracted by using a method of the above described Patent Document 1, as follows.                A memory 2 is added        An external storage device is added        A CPU 1 is replaced with a CPU 2        
However, since the technique of the above described Patent Document 1 does not include means for clipping a portion from the whole, it is not possible to generate the work instruction document for one server in the system of FIG. 47, or the like. For example, when attention is focused only on a server B, the memory 2 and the external storage device have been added. However, according to the above described method, such a partial difference cannot be detected.
In the field of the system installation, since the respective information devices are installed one by one, it is convenient to have a work instruction document in which a design change point for each information device can be understood. Particularly, in the case of construction of a complicated computer system, since a significant burden is imposed on the installation operator for the system, more detailed information such as a work instruction document in which the design change point for each portion can be easily understood is required.